I recently received an e-mail from a friend saying she had just made eight pizzas for her husband's birthday. "I'm so glad you told me to start with pizza dough," she said. So am I.

Whenever someone tells me they want to try baking bread but have no idea how to begin, I suggest they make pizza dough first. This is the equivalent of learning to bake biscuits or scones before attempting Danish pastry and eclairs.

The thought of baking your own bread can be a little frightening. It's time consuming, and numerous things can go wrong. Then if the end result is disappointing, there's never enough time to turn around and bake another loaf.

Italian Sausage, Mushroom, & Fresh Tomato Pizza (sausage recipe here)Pizza dough, on the other hand, is not temperamental or fussy. The actual hands on work takes less than ten minutes. You can let it rise for as little or as long as you like. It's difficult to ruin and will never let you down. Pizza dough disasters are rare.

The trick to making incredible pizzeria-style pizza in your regular old oven at home is to use a pizza, or baking, stone. There's simply no comparison to what happens to the crust when cooked directly on that very hot surface.

There are many shapes and sizes and thicknesses of baking stones available. Mine is 14"x15" and about 3/4" thick, and I've been using it for over ten 18 years. It's similar to this one, and is now dark and seasoned. After each use just brush it off. If you must wash it (after a spilled blackened cheese episode perhaps), use only water, never soap and a scrub brush.

Besides great sauce, I believe the secret to an incredible pizza is to use more of everything than you think you should: more sauce, more cheese, more toppings.

But sometimes a person desires a lighter pizza, especially when the weather is warm and appetites are smaller. I dreamed up this easy caramelized onion and garlic version one night when I was craving pizza crust and trying to figure out something interesting to serve with grilled steaks. I just sprinkled it with a little parmesan cheese, and it was a huge hit.

The next time I made my usual 'heavy' pizza, I cooked up an onion and garlic one as well, this time adding mozzarella. It was an even bigger hit. This was several years ago, and now when I make homemade pizza for certain people, both kinds are expected.

You can serve this pizza as a side dish in winter with steaks or lamb chops, or have large slices and a garden salad for a lovely summer dinner (yes, it's worth heating up the kitchen to make it). You can cut it into small slivers and offer them as appetizers, or even form tiny individual pizzas and present them as a delightful first course. This pizza is versatile.

The tastiest version I have ever made was the one I created a few nights ago using the first yellow, white, and red onions from the garden.

This was the perfect way to celebrate the harvest, as the onions were the star of the show. I've seen similar versions made with wild mushrooms or fresh herbs or whatever, but these are not for me. I use fresh mozzarella and either Parmesan or Pecorino Romano, but the other night I pulled out the Asiago by accident and tossed some of it on as well. It's hard to put too much cheese on a pizza.

Top quality ingredients are of the utmost importance. Use extra-virgin olive oil and the nicest cheeses you can find. Organic flours are inexpensive, readily available, and create a superior tasting final product. And of course you want the freshest onions and garlic—which you can even try growing yourself.

But I'll let you in on another secret: even if all you have laying around are two ratty looking onions and some garlic that has sprouted, your pizza will still be delicious.

You can find a recipe for basic pizza dough in almost any cookbook, or you can try mine. I've found that adding some sourdough starter to my pizza dough really improves the flavor and texture. This is also a great way to use up starter if you need to refresh your container of it but don't want to bake bread. See my sourdough starter pizza dough recipe at the end of the post.

This is a simple recipe that produces a crisp, chewy, and flavorful crust. It takes less than three hours from first step to first bite—which means you can decide at four o'clock on Saturday that you want pizza for dinner and be eating well before seven.

A digital kitchen scale makes measuring ingredients a snap. They're also great for portioning out dough for pizza, breads, and rolls. I love my Oxo Good Grips 11-pound scale, and often use it several times a day (it's also great for weighing postage). The pull-out display is awesome.

However, few kitchen scales are accurate enough when weighing a fraction of an ounce, so you're better off measuring things like yeast and salt in teaspoons or grams.

Place the bread flour in a large bowl. Stir in the yeast and salt. Add the water and stir until a soft, but not sticky, dough forms.

Turn the dough onto a floured surface and knead it for 4 minutes, sprinkling with a little flour each time it sticks to your hands or the counter. The dough should be quite soft. Just knead it by hand; it's easier and faster than getting out your big electric mixer.

Liberally sprinkle the mixing bowl with flour, place the dough back in it, and sprinkle the top of the dough with flour. Cover with a damp tea towel or cloth napkin and set in a warm place for two hours (or one hour if you're in a hurry).

An hour before baking your pizza, place a baking stone on the lowest rack in the oven, and set the temperature at 500°. (You never want to put a cold baking stone into a hot oven, as it may crack.)

Caramelized Onions and Garlic with Three Cheeses

For the onions:
You can cook the onion topping while the pizza dough is rising, or you can make it whenever you have time and keep it in the fridge. Thinly slice more onions than you think you need. If you're a nibbler, start with even more onions because the finished topping is addicting. Those garden onions were so good the other night that I managed to devour nearly half of the topping while it was cooling. (Note: even a plain, three-cheese pizza is scrumptious.)

Slowly cook the onions in a large skillet with plenty of olive oil until they are nice and caramelized, at least 35 minutes, or longer if you prefer them dark and crispy. Stir often. I cover mine for the first 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, peel and chop as many cloves of garlic as you like, sprinkling them with salt. When the onions are done, clear a space in the middle of the skillet, add the garlic, and cook for two minutes, stirring constantly. Do not allow the garlic to brown. Mix the garlic into the onions and transfer to a plate to cool if you have time.

Turn the risen dough out onto a lightly floured surface, and divide it into two or four pieces. I use a pastry scraper, sometimes called a dough scraper or bench scraper, which is also great for cleaning off my butcher block counter top. Flatten each piece of dough into a disk and let them rest for 10 to 15 minutes.

There are many ways to shape pizza dough; experiment to find what works for you. Smaller pizzas are easier to shape than larger ones. I simply hold the disk of dough in front of me by one edge and use gravity and my fingers to gently stretch it into a larger circle.

I then lower it onto a wooden pizza peel that has been dusted with plenty of cornmeal, and finish stretching it into the shape and thickness I want, pinching together any tears. You can also set it on a rimless baking sheet, or directly onto your pizza pan if you aren't using a baking stone.

Don't worry if your pizzas aren't perfect circles. If you like a thick edge on your pizza, go around the outside of the circle and fold the dough over, pressing it down and sealing it with your fingers.

Scatter the onion and garlic mixture evenly over the crust and then sprinkle the cheese on top. I use about 8 ounces of mozzarella per pizza, plus a few handfuls of coarsely grated parmesan or romano and asiago. Fresh mozzarella balls or logs should be sliced rather than grated.

Gently shake the peel to make sure the pizza is not stuck to it (no worries here if you're using the parchment paper), and then carefully slide the pizza onto the hot baking stone.This is done in one quick move, and it can take some practice, but all mistakes are edible.

My baking stone is about 14 inches by 15 inches and will hold one 12-inch pizza or two 8-inch pizzas.

Bake until the crust is golden and the cheese has started to brown, about 10-14 minutes. If I know I'll be freezing and reheating a pizza later, I undercook it by a couple of minutes. Assemble the next pizza when the first one is nearly done; the uncooked pizzas do not rise at all but go straight into the oven.

Use your pizza peel to remove the pizza from the oven or just slide it right onto a pizza pan. I use an aluminum blade peel for sliding pizzas and breads into and out of the oven; I recommend buying the biggest size you can.

Cut into slices, serve, and wait for everyone to sing your praises.

Click here to read about the only thing that tastes even better than a pizza you made yourself.

Sourdough starters are easy to make. The initial process takes a few days, but the actual hands-on work is minimal. Recipes for sourdough starters abound in cookbooks and online. I made my 5-year-old levain starter using the recipe in Bread Alone by Daniel Leader, one of my favorite bread books. The easiest thing to do, though, is to get some from somebody else. Ask around; you might be surprised by who has one living in their fridge.

You can make my Straightforward Pizza Dough recipe, reducing the amount of water to 1 cup (240 ml / 8 oz / 224 grams), and simply toss 1 cup (240 ml / 8 oz / 224 g) of sourdough starter straight from the fridge into the mix. But if you have the time, it's best if you add a little flour and water to your cup of starter and let it sit awhile:

Combine starter, water, and bread flour in a small bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature for 8 to 10 hours (or less if that's all the time you have). Proceed with my Straightforward Pizza Dough recipe, but reduce the amount of water to 1 cup / 240 ml / 8 oz / 224 g.

Hi Paul,Thanks for the comment. But hmmm. . . I clicked on your name and for some reason it linked right to a (months old) tantalizing picture of Biscuits & Gravy--one of my very favorite foods. Can't help wonder if this isn't payback for the pizza photo? :)

As for oiling the dough:Okay, I realize that I may indeed be the only person on the planet who does not coat their bowl and pizza/bread dough with oil. A friend read this post and immediately bombarded me with links to various websites, saying "Look, even [insert famous foodie's name here] oils the dough!"

I used to oil the dough. And I used to end up with this slippery blob that was impossible to knead or shape. Made no sense to me. I thought about all those shaped loaves of dough that proof (second rise) in floured canvas couches and baskets. Without oil.

So I tried generously sprinkling the dough bowl (I use a wooden one)and the top of the dough with flour. A moist tea towel keeps a dry "skin" from forming on the dough. Voila! No more oily mess. So that's it. I guess oil must work for some people, but I encourage you to try my method at least once. It even saves you a little time.

Hi SusanI agree with the no oil... I normally do that, but I didnt the other day when I made the rolls (risen in fridge over night) and it was really soppy on the bottom .. ugh. esp since I didnt want to destroy the bubbles by working the dough to hard.

My fav pizza is really thinly sliced potates marinated in alittle olive oil, garlic, lemonrind, rosemary, S&P. spread in a single layer with a sprinkle of parmesan or pecorino... YUM (or with a later of smoked salmon underneath ;)

Clare,Well now you've got me craving pizza. That combination sounds delicious--all ingredients I love. I am counting the days until I can dig up the first red new potatoes in the garden, and I have plenty of fresh rosemary. Mmmm, can't wait. Thanks for the idea.

(Or you can pull out your leftover half sandwich on the plane and make all of the other passengers jealous.)

Did you remember my telling you about my doing this? It was a whole Carnegie Deli Pastrami sandwich and everyone in coach started looking around to see where that delicious aroma was coming from as they were served their "inflight meal!"

I have always used about 1 Tbsp of good olive oil IN the dough, but I am going to try yours. Our problem is no source of bread flour, so we have to combine soft wheat and hard wheat flour and try to get it right. My Italian neighbors use only soft flour, but the results are disappointing.The bonus is that if you live alone, you make a pizza from 1/2 and then what is called pizza fornarina with the other half. It has coarse salt, rosemary on top and is drizzled with oil after. It can be wrapped and frozen, unlike ordinary pizza.

Hi Clare,LOL, after knowing you for the past 8 months, I don't feel so bad for you. In fact, I'm envious of all the incredible food available to you in and around Sydney--including the bounty I've seen from your mother's garden! : )

Hi Judith,I used to put 1 or 2 Tablespoons of olive oil in the dough, and then for some reason I stopped. I didn't see a huge difference. I thought it would affect the texture of the dough more than it did.

Oh, to be in Italy and have such flour dilemmas! *envy* Your pizza fornarina sounds divine! : )

Hi Foodfreak (love that name),Welcome to the farm! I'm so glad you had pizza dough success. And thanks for taking the time to let me know. I look forward to hearing from you again. : )

The Pizza dough recipe is perfect. I like doughy pies with a good crust and turned out to be perfect. I could hold a piece by its edge and it would stand level and yet when I bit into it it was nice and chewy. Thanks for the recipe

Hi Anon,I'm so glad you liked the pizza dough! And I really appreciate your taking the time to let me know. Great description, too. We really love how this crust comes out. In fact, I'm making pizza tonight! ; )

Hi SusanThis post is ages old and maybe you won't have time for a question, but...

I have followed your advice and started my bread-making dreams with pizza and I LOVE this pizza dough. However, I seem to have a real issue with it shrinking back up and making a really thick crust. I love the crust so much that I don't really mind...but it does result in the crust rather overwhelming the toppings!! Am I not letting it rest long enough before shaping? Has it not risen enough? Any words of advice?

Oh, and I've been using a pizza stone on the grill with great success - much better than heating up the house in July!!

So good and so easy! I was nervous to try pizza dough, but it came out delicious. This post also inspired me to make carmelized onion topping which was brilliant.

Karen--I shaped the dough by picking it up and letting its weight stretch it out. It got quite thin and didn't stretch back. It doesn't make for an even or very round crust, but it you like rustic you should try it.

Your dough looks absolutely beautiful!! I love making pizza dough; it truly is easy, as you say.

I disagree, however, with the stone comment. I have baked my homemade dough on my pizza stone and on the back of a jelly roll pan. Both turned out beautifully and tasted wonderful. I don't use the stone anymore because the jelly roll produces the same results without the hassle of trying to move the dough to the stone. Of course, a pizza peel could facilitate this problem, but why bother buying additional equipment if the jelly roll pan works just fine?!

Anyway, thanks for encouraging others to make their own dough. I will have to try out your recipe whenever I want pizza the same day. I use the Reinhart recipe using cold water as my go-to recipe, but you have to make it at least one day in advance.

Hi,Your pizza dough sounds really wonderfull!, it's amazing to see so many different pizza recipies, where i come from, the basic pizza, is called all dressed, and consists of tomato sauce, mushrooms, pepperoni, green pepper, and cheese , my home made version is made with pita bread, it gives you a thin crust which i love, and less calories., I will try your version , as it sounds wonderfull! I have never heard of pizza containing potatoes, but i would like to try one!

Hi Anna,Yes, I still add a teaspoon of instant yeast to my pizza dough when I make it with sourdough starter. I'm using the starter mostly for flavor. The dough rises a little more quickly with the starter in it, but I usually still give it about two hours - or longer if I get tied up doing some farm thing.

You could omit the yeast and use only the sourdough starter, but it would need to rise quite a bit longer. That's something I should experiment with! : )

What's nice about this pizza dough is that it's flexible - let it rise for an hour if that's all the time you have, or give it the full two hours if you can. If it's cool in your kitchen, let it rise longer, and if it's hot, reduce the rise time and/or use less yeast - say 1/2 teaspoon instead of 1 teaspoon.

I'm discovering this post 4 years hence, but nonetheless let me say thank you for such a great pizza dough recipe (just the basic, not the sourdough, though that sounds super too). Your recipe allowed us to actually have homemade pizza on a weeknight! I couldn't believe how easy and quick your recipe is -only one 3 minute kneeding! My standard recipe, which is quite delicious, calls for 2 rather lengthy kneedings. I used a scale per your recommendation -great idea - the weight was a good sum less than than recommended cup measurement!

Hi Susan,Looks like Nancy isn't the only one stumbling upon this previous post. Me too!!!

I happened to drop in while searching for recipes for the National Cheese Pizza Day (Sept. 5th) post I plan on doing. I was wondering whether you would mind very much if I "grabbed" that gorgeous picture to include in my post? I Would of course link bake to your informative, fun post. Thanks for sharing...

I didn't happen to see an oven temperature for the pizza dough...did I miss this or what do you recommend? We usually heat up our stone at about 500 for 20 minutes and then drop the temperature down...but I was curious what you do. Can't wait to try it!

dear farmgirl,i made your pizza today. i am not known for my amazing pizza, in fact, my pizza is usually just o k. but today, thanks to your recipe, i was awesome.

i posted about it on my personal family blog, and i'm including a link back to your recipe in my post. please feel free to contact me if you do not wish to be linked.i assure you, i had only good things to say!

When my husband and I first met we always made homemade pizza! Somehow along the way though we stopped and suddenly realized how much we missed a good home cooked pizza made just how we like it. I really want to try this and must make the dough using Kamut Khorasan Wheat flour for perfection!! :) Thank you for the inspiration!

We just made homemade pizza for dinner, for the first time, using your pizza dough recipe. I did NOT use oil by the way. It was perfect! Everyone in the family LOVED it. Thank you so much for sharing and giving me the courage to make my own dough. Love u and your cute little farm!

Wow. GREAT pizza dough. I have made pizza from scratch for over 30 years. Sometimes the dough was great and sometimes it wasn't. But this recipe is awesome every time. Thank YOU!

This time I made the same topping--carmelized onions. I really didn't think I would like it--thought it would be too dry without a sauce on it. I did add a few strained home canned tomatoes with a little oregano and basil and some crumbled bacon, but the main topping was the onions and garlic. Heavenly! Can't believe how good this is.

For what it's worth, I absolutely love this pizza dough. It's easy and the kneading is a great opportunity to relieve stress from sitting at the desk all day! Just the other day I made two batches of this dough, split it into eight (sort of) equal balls, wrapped them in plastic and then shoved two at a time into pint-sized freezer safe mason jars, and THEN put them in the freezer. Today, the craving for pizza struck...so at about 1pm, I pulled one jar out, placed each ball in a floured bowl (covered it with plastic wrap and dusted the ball before covering), and stuck them in my oven with the light on to rise. When I came home from work, they were beautifully doubled, and ready to bake! While my pizza stone pre-heated we got the pizzas and the toppings ready, and my husband and I enjoyed home-made pizza, followed with home-made white chocolate raspberry raw milk ice cream....can't beat that. It's so easy. You have to try it!

I'm looking forward to trying this recipe. Hubby and I were just talking about pizza dough recipes and how he can never seem to find one that isn't for 30 pies. I told him I would look for one and "viola!" I found yours!

Hi, I LOVVVVVEEEEE basil and bought a purple basil this summer. I was disappointed when only one stem survived my transplanting, but I still have one healthly stem! I was wondering what I could do with it. I rub the stem and it's not as fragrant as sweet basil. So I googled "purple basil" and chose your url. Well I am so excited after only 20 minutes on your site. Thank you for this incredible site. And I will be trying your pizza recipe tonight!

I am a huge fan of your site and I had a question. It might be silly but how do you make the sourdough starter. I can find one from friends and I want to learn how to make it right. I feel like your site is helping me be a better cook and your explanations on each recipes are great.

I'm so glad you're enjoying my recipes - and that's not a silly question at all. :) I make my sourdough starter using the instructions in Daniel Leader's Bread Alone, which is one of my favorite bread books. His instructions are easy to follow and I like the flavor of the starter.

That said, there are several kinds of sourdough starter and several ways to make them, and there are lots of instructions available online. You could try doing a google search and see which ones appeal to you. Good luck!

Susan have you ever tried using Focaccia Bread for the pizza crust. I tried it and its delicious. My kids love it. so now im not aloud to order pizza and they ask me to make it instead. I love it because my son loves to help me make the sauce. He told me that we need to give our sauce recipe to the pizza places around here. I love a lot of your recipes and have tried a lot. They are delicious. THank you for posting such good recipes. Theresa Simmons pink.

Hi Shayna,I'm so glad you're enjoying my recipes! I've never had good luck freezing pizza dough, though some people swear by it. By the time I've waited for the dough to defrost (which can take a couple of hours), I could have just made it from scratch right then, and my frozen dough never comes out as nice as fresh.

The same goes with bread dough - I have much better luck baking two or three loaves and freezing the baked bread rather than dealing with frozen dough. :)

That said, if you want to try freezing your pizza dough, I would let it rise for about 60 to 90 minutes and then freeze it - wrapped tightly in plastic and then put in a zipper bag.

Defrost at room temperature or you could try defrosting it overnight in the fridge. A lot of the refrigerated 'fresh' pizza dough sold in stores was originally frozen.

Hi Farmgirl,I stumbled upon your pizza dough recipe a couple days ago while trying to figure out what went wrong with my very first loaf of bread..."Basic White Bread" from thekitchn.com. Tonight I made a homemade pizza using your dough recipe, but halved it since I only have one pizza pan and no baking stone. It came out fabulous! Nice n soft and chewy...just the way my family and I like it. ....and it didn't matter that I flubbed it up some. I put in a little too much water and then added a little more flour to compensate.No more hand-topped Tombstone frozen pizza (used them as a base to create my own "gourmet style" pizzas). Only reason I did that is I had no idea it was so easy to just make my own dough. For toppings I made the caramelized onions but this time in a cast iron skillet. I finally had success! All attempts in the past have been in stainless steel, never could get them to caramelize properly. Anyways, I gave it a "Texican" twist with refried beans...open 2 cans no salt added pinto beans (dad is on a salt restricted diet). Fry the unmashed beans in the cast iron skillet to pick up the onion flavor. Add a roughly rounded teaspoon of chili powder (I used chili 9000 from Penzey's Spices), a pinch of both onion and garlic powder (also from Penzey's). After about 3 minutes (didn't time it) I carefully mashed the beans while still in the skillet and continue heating for another couple minutes. Add bean juice to make the mixture easily spreadable but not too wet. Remove from skillet and then spread on dough before adding the caramelized onions....and topped with cheese...unfortunately I don't think I used enough! LOL Anyways...I will definitely be making your pizza dough again, maybe with whole wheat flour next time. :)Cheers from Texas!-Anchoret

December 2015 update: Hi! For some reason I can't figure out, Blogger hasn't been letting me leave comments on my own blog (!) for the last several months, so I've been unable to respond to your comments and questions. My apologies for any inconvenience! You're always welcome to email me: farmgirlfare AT gmail DOT com.

Hi! Thanks for visiting Farmgirl Fare and taking the time to write. While I'm not always able to reply to every comment, I receive and enjoy reading them all.

Your feedback is greatly appreciated, and I especially love hearing about your experiences with my recipes. Comments on older posts are always welcome!

Please note that I moderate comments, so if I'm away from the computer it may be a while before yours appears.

I try my best to answer all questions, though sometimes it takes me a few days. And sometimes, I'm sorry to say, they fall through the cracks, and for that I sincerely apologize.

I look forward to hearing from you and hope you enjoy your e-visits to our farm!